HDD Versus SSD – External Back-up

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Hi All

Just after some thoughts and feedback regarding an external back-up drive.

I currently have a Crucial X8 2TB but would like to get an additional back-up drive so that I can carry the Crucial with me. I am going for 4TB; this will sit permanently on the desk and permanently plugged in to teh docking station.

Having looked around I am considering 2 options.

1 – WD Elements which is an HDD.

2 – Purchase a Crucial MX500 and put that in a SATA enclosure, whch I already have. Will need to purchase a longer USB3 Type A to Micro B cable but thats not a big issue.

Despite the obvious fact that SSD’s are faster than HDD’s is there any really benefit in having an SSD when that item is solely going to be used for my computer back-ups. While not a major factor the difference in price between the two is £120.

Any thoughts, ideas and opinions greatly appreciated

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Ratters,

First, when you say it will permanently be in the dock I hope you will NOT have it connected to the computer! If it’s connected all the time it’s not a backup as anything that can infect your computer can now also infect your “backup” drive.

Now, IMHO I’d go with the HDD as it’s cheaper per TB/GB/MB, how ever you want to measure it, and since you’re connecting over USB you don’t really need the speed of an SSD as the USB connection is the limiting factor. Of course if you have USB 4 or 5 that’s another story.

I personally use a USB 3.0 Dock, about 30-40 USD, that will accept 3.5 or 2.5″ drives (HDD or SSD). This has several benefits over an integrated solution like WD Elements. First if the drive fails you don’t have to replace the electronics and vice versa. Secondly, you can have multiple backup drives and rotate them to guard against single drive failure and also it allows for an Off-Site copy to protect against destruction of your abode and it’s contents.

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Ratters1960

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Some studies indicate that if an SSD is not powered up, or perhaps rewritten enough, the data could be lost over long time periods.  https://www.anandtech.com/show/9248/the-truth-about-ssd-data-retention  On the other hand, if a traditional hard drive is dropped, it can readily fail.  For backup, I would go with spinning hard drives, but buy 2 and backup to both frequently.

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Ratters1960

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SSDs must meet minimum power off storage times, but all offline disks should be checked regularly to ensure they are good.
See this post for a simple way to check your offline disks.

cheers, Paul

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Ratters1960

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My general rule is hard drives for long term storage or backups, and SSDs for live data.

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Hi All

Thank you very much for your feedback – much appreciated.

@ Steviebops. That is a good rule and is one I was looking at which is why I was looking at the WD product.

@ RetiredGeek. No it won’t be permanently attached to the computer. Though the back-up will only run when I instruct it to rather than on an on going process. Your idea of using a dock makes sense and is something I had considered.

I have looked at HDD’s and it seems that to get a 4TB HDD I need to have a 3.5in ( not a problem) . Ideally I would like one with 7200rpm to allow for faster transfer, it will be connected to a USB 3.0 port. However, I do seem to be limited in choice when it comes to wanting 7200rpm. The ones I have found are WD Gold Enterprise (5 yr warranty) and Seagate Exos 7E10 (5 yr warranty) I also looked at the Toshiba x300 pro but difficult to get these in the UK. I am also trying to future proof as I will have to replace my laptop some time next year when Win 10 comes to end of life. It won’t run Win 11.

Just to give some additional info on laptop. Lenovo T530 running Win 10 Pro. with 2 hard drives. C: drive is 512Gb and runs all the programs. E: drive is 2TB and stores all files (documents, photos etc.)

 

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Take a look at the WD Black drives. 7200rpm.

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Ratters1960

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You don’t need maximum file transfer speed, you need a regular backup. It doesn’t matter if it takes an extra 5 minutes to backup.

Save the money and spend it on a good coffee while you relax, safe in the knowledge you have a backup. 🙂

cheers, Paul

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Ratters1960

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I switched from an external 2TB HDD (7200 rpm) to an external 2TB SSD about 3 years ago for my full image backups.

Both are USB 3 devices plugged into a USB port on my PC but there was a “significant reduction” in how long it took to finish a backup.

The HDD took ~35 mins to backup ~64GB, the SSD takes less than 8 mins to backup the same ~64GB.

BTW, I do my full image backups weekly so there’ll be no problem where the SSD is without power long enough that it “might” lose data bits.

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Ratters1960

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Hi All

Firstly I wanted to say thank you to all for your input, it really was appreciated.

Having taken on board what has been said I have narrowed my choice of HDD to either a 4TB Seagate Barracuda which uses smr or the 4TB Western Digital which uses cmr. From what I have read smr seems perfectly suitable for my needs, since this HDD will onlyt be used for Backups. That said backups will be done daily or at least every other day.

If any one can share their experience of either of these two HDD’s I’d be grateful.

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For daily backups you could opt for a single disk NAS. Then the backup can be scheduled so you don’t have to remember. (This is what I do.)

Using a NAS for backup requires you set it up so that the backup share is not available to machines on your network without supplying specific credentials, which you enter into the backup software. This prevents malware accessing the backup location.

cheers, Paul

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